In December 2013 Limerick City Council unanimously endorsed the city’s new Integration Plan, Integrating Limerick 2013-2016: Towards Intercultural Limerick.

Limerick Manager, Conn Murray, spoke of the importance of ensuring that the migrant voice and underlined Limerick City and County Council’s commitment to the Integration Working Group and the implementation of this Plan during the next three years. Each of the key themes of the Integration Plan is linked with one of the EU Common Basic Principles on Integration and to the Intercultural Cities policy principles.

Mr Murray described the importance of intercultural integration for the development of the city: “By fully implementing the actions set out in this Integration Plan we will be helping to promote a vibrant, inclusive, dynamic and multicultural society in Limerick. Ireland is home to thousands of migrants who carry with them the same ambitions and dreams that our ancestors once carried with them during our centuries of emigration. The challenge for us as a community and society is not to just engage positively with this reality but also to harness our collective ability to embrace this change for the benefit of everyone concerned, regardless of one’s nationality, faith or ethnic background.”